


along dusty roads and broken tiles the winds sing (of a distant home and long-lost glory)

by paranoid_fridge



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, FemBagginshield, FemBagginshield17, First Meetings, Magic, Slow Burn, and the world's a mess, bilbo as a magical geographer, fem!Bilbo, fem!Thorin, historic HP AU, it's 1917
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-07-30
Packaged: 2018-12-09 01:40:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11658939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paranoid_fridge/pseuds/paranoid_fridge
Summary: Osh, 1917.After nearly a year of search has brought her all the way up from Northern India to dusty Osh, magical geographer Bilbo Baggins finally discovers a lead on the legendary country of Erebor. However, nomad leader Thorin Oakenshield at first does not want to share the location of her lost homeland with Bilbo.Then the situation in Osh takes a turn for the worse.





	along dusty roads and broken tiles the winds sing (of a distant home and long-lost glory)

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: one character (Bifur) dies off screen. Other than that? There are terrible implications aplenty in this, but it's all off screen, and some might even be considered allusions to obscure history... (and then there is the stuff I'm making up. Aka yes, I did read up on Central Asian history, but hey, I'm adding Erebor into it. And magic.)

“Where did you get this?” Bilbo asks the vendor as she turns the green ceramic tile over in her hand. The edges have been broken and the blue and golden lines decorating it are not unlike the patterns she recently saw at the grand ruins of Samarqand, well-hidden underneath layers of dust, sand, and ash.

The vendor barely glances at her, busy with sorting through one of many sacks of camel hair sitting behind his stall. “That?” he asks, not stopping his well-practiced movements, “Kashgar. Was supposed to go to Nanjing, but apparently there’s trouble that way.”

“There’s trouble everywhere lately,” Bilbo returns drily, eliciting a bitter laugh that swiftly disappears within the market’s lively late afternoon din.

The vendor nods toward two younger men dressed in plain uniforms, who look rather out of place among the more traditionally dressed market goers of dusty Osh with its rocky roads and cold nights.  “As long as all the Bolsheviks want are good coats for winter...”

The tsar had demanded more, far more. Bilbo has passed abandoned villages and burning forts. Even under the hot summer sun she’d felt cold, and as the shadows lengthen around her the wind from the mountains already carries a hint of falling temperatures.  

“Let’s hope so,” Bilbo replies, forcing the war from her mind, and contemplates whether or not to buy the tile. Remnants of magic cling to it - a very different magic from the one that lingered in Samarqand - however, it doesn’t reveal any information beyond, and Bilbo doubts any diagnostic spell will reveal more.

She turns to the vendor again. “Say, can you point me toward your supplier?”

The translation charm bungles the last word; Bilbo notices it the moment it leaves her lips. With all the different dialects spoken in the region, it’s been happening more often than not - but Osh’s market draws a varied crowd and dressed like the locals she’s not drawn any attention.

Unlike the male colleagues she’d spoken with at the London Society for Magical Geography. They’d cursed and whined and claimed it was impossible to chart the region with the ancient magical communities there disbanded, many borders closed, and papers impossible to procure.

Bilbo so far faced very little trouble. But then, most men - whether they were fighting for communism, the tsar, their God(s), the British Empire, a Khanate, or the Chinese Republic - happily ignored the small, traditionally dressed woman passing them by. (And her wand and a few nasty spells took care of any other type of unwanted attention).

“Turn east from Suleiman Too, head out of the city. There’s a Buddhist temple, ask for the Mongolians,” the vendor tells Bilbo, just as somebody at the other end of the stall gestures for his attention. “How much for the cotton?” a woman dressed richly ornamented black demands to know, and for her he abandons his camel hair.

Bilbo isn’t bothered; instead she drops down a generous amount of coins - far more than the shard’s worth - and pockets the piece. It’s a better lead than she’s come across in weeks, so she decides to head east.

A few hours of daylight are left before the sun completely vanishes beyond the western mountains and their snowcapped peaks. It should be enough, she thinks, tugging her white headscarf into place. 

* * *

 

The sun is already setting when Bilbo arrives in the area, having hitched a ride on a donkey cart. Its driver - and she’d hope for information from him - had a spark of magic to him, but whatever happened had left him toothless and incomprehensible even to her advanced translation charm. Dust crunches under her feet as she directs her steps further east - the streets have emptied, but that’s also because most have headed inside to pray. Bilbo takes a deep breath, glad for the quiet - and catches a faint whiff of incense.

Well, she thinks with a smile to herself, that is one way to find the Buddhist temple. Obviously, she might be wrong - but for now she follows her nose right toward a building that at first she wouldn’t have noticed.

Heh, Bilbo thinks excitedly, walking closer, probably a notice-me-not charm repelling unwanted attention. She has come about very few traces of recent magic in the area; her London colleagues hadn’t been wrong about the old Silk Road communities being long scattered to the wind.

Still, here is at least one person alive and casting spells. She climbs the steps - in far better condition than most other buildings in the neighborhood - and stops for a moment to study the decorations on the red door. If she’s not entirely wrong the temple belongs to the Gelugpa tradition, which is not utterly unexpected - they aren’t that far from Tibet here, but she’d not anticipated a more syncretic temple.

Bilbo knocks on the door.

A tingle runs down her spine as her fingers touch the red-painted wood. Magic, though it’s quite different from the type she knows.

What a good lead this piece of broken ceramic is turning out to be, she thinks smugly to herself as she waits. But no response to her knock occurs, and from her vantage point Bilbo cannot see any light in the windows.

Not one to be easily deterred, Bilbo idly makes her way around the building toward the back. Within a dim lane shaded by craggy trees Bilbo finds a plain door secured with a thick iron chain. The rather old-fashioned lock is easily opened with a quiet _alohomora_ , and Bilbo’s conscience takes a moment to remind her that she is theoretically breaking and entering.

But then again she is also theoretically traveling through the area without valid papers (she’d gotten travel permission form the embassy of the Russian Empire in British India, and the Empire no longer exists), so breaking and entering won’t make things worse. Also, she tells herself, this is a temple.

Most temples she’s come across have been willing to welcome travelers.

With her wand held ready, Bilbo pushes the door open, holding her breath, but nothing stirs. It’s warm inside, and she’s glad to be out of the rapidly cooling wind. Slowly, her eyes grow used to the dim light and she finds herself directly at the back of the temple’s main hall.

Lit butter lamps cast a warm, yellow light over the huge statue seated at the room’s heart, while flickering shadows make the faces painted on the walls and pillars dance. Colorful banners hang from the ceiling, swaying softly in the draft.

Nothing stirs. But Bilbo watches the flames flicker and realizes there must be another open door, another corridor. The skin on the back of her neck prickles.

“Hello?” Bilbo calls into the grand hall, stopping where she is. She can’t see or sense anyone, but she is sure somebody’s there. “I’m looking for the Mon - “

She notices the movement at the very last moment. A blade flashes through the air, and Bilbo dances back, brings up her wand, spell on her lips - only to freeze when another blade rather gently taps against her back.

“Don’t move, lass, and we won’t hurt ye,” a gruff voice instructs.

Bilbo, obediently, freezes. Her heart continues to hammer in her throat - this was ill thought out, she shouldn’t have snuck in, should have waited, but maybe she can take them, they don’t -

The room becomes a bit brighter as a third person approaches bearing an oil lantern. Clad in a padded beige del and with a shock of white hair, he radiates the sort of kind disappointment Bilbo’s grandfather held after she’d broken her grandmother’s favorite vase.

“Don’t frighten her, brother,” he tells the taller of the two who have apprehended Bilbo. She can now see that the man before her is tall and broad-shouldered; the one behind her appears to be more of the small and sneaky type. Both lower their blades and Bilbo breathes a little easier. “Lass probably was just looking for a place to rest.”

“What brings you here?” he asks of Bilbo, and the pitch in the charm changes. Bilbo abruptly realizes that he’s talking to her in another language - meaning they all assume she hasn’t understood what they just said.

She fumbles for a moment, until she’s sure the translation charm won’t accidentally get her into trouble.  “I am looking for someone,” Bilbo says, contemplating the clothes of the men before her. They certainly aren’t local - perhaps she already found the correct persons? “A vendor at the market told me to ask for the Mongolian?”

“Well, you found three,” the one who snuck up behind her returns with an easy grin. Bilbo doesn’t miss how he slips his wicked-looking blade into his del’s belt with quick, steady hands. The tall one barks out a laugh; and the white haired one shakes his head with exasperation.

“I’m looking for the one who delivered this,” Bilbo says, and procures the piece of ceramic from her dark red vest.

The air shifts instantly, though the one with the hidden knife is quick to quip: “Eh, that looks like those pieces that come out of Khiva and Bukhara all the time.”

“But this doesn’t,” Bilbo replies firmly and gives them all a flat, serene smile.

“Lassie, you’re - “ the man begins again, but this time the white-haired man interrupts him in the language Bilbo isn’t supposed to understand.

“Leave it, Nori,” he instructs. “She knows. I don’t know how, but she does.”

“How do you know that?” The second man demands of her with his arms folded over his chest. He’s probably twice as broad as Bilbo, and she feels her throat go dry.

“The ornaments are different,” Bilbo explains, and then decides to show a little more of her hand despite being uncomfortable. “I’ve been trying to track down the origin of these tiles, and I have been to Bukhara and Khiva and Samarqand, but while they look similar, the patterns are actually very different.”

The white-haired man nods, looking almost impressed.

“Also,” Bilbo adds with a shrug and a lighter smile. “The man who sold me this told me it came from Kashgar.”

Somebody grumbles, but the one who had been called Nori grins at that. “He’s also the one who told you to come here?”

Bilbo nods.

“I think,” the white-haired man eventually says with a sigh. “We would best discuss this with our leader.” 

* * *

 

In the end Bilbo has to wait for two days to meet the illustrious leader; one Thorin Oakenshield - who, it is conveyed to her by Nori whom she runs into at the Bazaar again, would prefer not to meet at all. Bilbo’s semi-serious attempt at bribing doesn’t gain any ground, but it does gain her Nori’s good humor and they end up sharing locally brewed vodka under the linen shades of a rest house, gazing out at snow-covered mountains.

“Royalty,” Nori mutters with a slight slur to his words. “Honor and duty and everything. Selling those tiles, you’d think we were selling children.”

“They weren’t supposed to be sold?” Bilbo asks, pretending to lazily swirl the liquid in her glass to hide her excitement. She’s finally - after all those months of loose ends, false positives, and pointless excursions - found a promising lead. She’s so close, she can almost taste it.

Let her colleagues at home eat their words when she brings back proof of Erebor’s existence.

Nori shakes his head, and tips his cowboy hat (an actual cowboy hat from America, Bilbo has learned earlier) forward to shade his face. “Not at all. But there’s not much left to sell. The cattle was drafted, the harvest bad, and winter’s never kind…” He shrugs.

Bilbo crosses her legs to stop herself from vibrating in her seat. “It rarely is,” she agrees. “But the last winter was especially unkind.”

Nori tilts his head. “You’re not from around here,” he remarks, a sly glint to his eye.

“No,” Bilbo agrees easily. “But so are you.”

Nori grins. “True, but you’re from even further afield. Balin said something yesterday, thinks you might be one of those archaeologists that have been wandering around.” He takes a sip of his vodka and then flashes her a grin full of sharp teeth. “Dwalin thought you were a spy.”

Bilbo takes a swig as well, the burn chasing away the implications. Spies - whether British, Russian, or Chinese - have not been suffered well here. “The former, mostly,” she hastens to clarify. “I’m more of a geologist, to be honest.”

“And you’ve been looking for the origin of those tiles?” Nori asks again.

“You know where they come from,” Bilbo accuses.

“Then you know why that’s secret,” Nori shoots back.

 

* * *

 

“Thorin will see you now,” Balin tells Bilbo as he steps out into the waiting room where Bilbo has quietly been sipping her tea among fine silk pillows. Despite the building’s plain outward appearance, the quarters within speak of dated decadence.

“Thank you,” Bilbo replies, getting to her feet. Today she has forgone the local dress, instead decided on a smart London suit underneath her white chapan and allowed some of her curls to spill out from beneath the headscarf, the way she’s seen it done in Tashkent.

Past the door she finds herself transported to more distant lands. Thick carpets line the floor and walls, a grand chandelier provides light, and seated cross legged on a throne of pillows is another woman. Her black and silver-streaked hair spills out from underneath a fur-trimmed hat; the dark blue coat heavily embroided in silver.

In the same patterns as on the tile, Bilbo realizes with elation.

“Thank you for meeting me,” Bilbo greets with a curtsy; finally catching the other woman’s eyes and finding them hard and without welcome. Still, she dons a polite smile as she sits down on the cushions on the other side of the table.

“You were most adamant,” Thorin replies coolly from her throne. “Balin tells me you are some sort of an adventurer?”

“A scientist,” Bilbo hedges.

Thorin huffs. “In these parts there is no difference. Strangers that trample across our lands, demand answers and then tell us we are stupid and doing everything wrong,” her lips twist bitterly. “And then they come and take our things, too. Claiming to preserve them for the sake of history in some distant museums.”

Magical archaeologists, Bilbo knows, haven’t performed any better than their muggle counterparts in this regard.

“That is not my intention,” she replies quietly, cautiously.

“And yet you, too, have come bearing pieces from our ancestral lands, demanding to know its location.” Thorin reaches for a long pipe that has sat on the low table next to a pile of papers.

Bilbo swallows. Reaches for the tile in the bag she carries and demonstratively sets it on the table before her.

“I do not intend to keep this,” she explains, her voice steady despite feeling anxious. “If you wish I shall leave it in this room when I leave. For now I only ask you listen.”

Bilbo draws a deep breath. She hasn’t had to explain herself to anybody in a very long time - not since Gandalf gave her that first piece of the puzzle back at home together with a ticket to India.

“My interest in Erebor -” She doesn’t miss how Thorin stiffens at the name - “is perhaps both shallow and personal. I am a geographer, however, have been largely derided both for being a woman and believing in something widely considered a myth.”

“So you have come to satisfy your curiosity,” Thorin summarizes, eyes ablaze with disdain.

But that Bilbo expected. “Yes,” she agrees serenely. “But I have also come to put at rest the ashes of a dear friend whose deathbed wish was to be brought home.”

Thorin’s eyes widen and her entire posture straightens. “Who?” she begins, and Bilbo realizes that underneath the ornaments and the deep lines of her face, Thorin isn’t much older than her. “What was their name?”

“He was calling himself Brad when he came to work for us,” Bilbo returns quietly, thinking of the cheerful wide grin and the sometimes wistful gaze cast toward the east. “Later he revealed his name was Bifur.”

Thorin pales further. Bilbo buries her fingers in the wide sleeves of her chapan, pressing her lips together. Her suspicion was correct then; those that survive of Erebor are but a small group. Yet there is no joy in reporting death.

“How did he die?” Thorin demands to know. The pipe in her hand trembles and Bilbo’s heart goes out to her.

“The war,” she replies solemnly. “He was one of the first to be drafted. When they returned him to us, barely a year later, he was badly wounded, and - had trouble talking.” In truth he could only talk in his native dialect, but Bilbo cannot reveal that yet. Not without inspiring further questions. “We cared for him as good as we could, but in the end he passed away,” Bilbo concludes her narrative. “He did ask to be brought back home.”

My buttons and my ashes, he’d whispered, half-delirious with fever, ashen fingers clutching Bilbo’s hand. To Erebor, where they belong.

“In that case I thank you on behalf of his family and my people,” Thorin says warmly, drawing Bilbo out of her memories, and she finds the air between them has shifted. “They will be glad to know his fate.”

Bilbo inclines her head. “He was a good friend.” And the pain at his loss still stabs at her heart.

Thorin nods. “However, you still cannot come with us,” she says, the faint gentleness vanishing again. “Much as we owe you thanks, the location of our ancestral home is a secret I cannot share.”

And Bilbo wants to kick something in frustration.

She grinds her teeth. “The promise was I should take him home.” So she will not hand the precious bundle over to anybody else.

“And you have kept your promise,” Thorin replies evenly. “Indeed, you have gone beyond what any could have expected of you.”

Bilbo’s fingers now very much itch to wrap themselves around the sun-tanned neck.

“This sounds rather like something my male London colleagues would tell me,” Bilbo snipes back, because her tongue has less patience. “Don’t trouble yourself, Miss Baggins, you have done well considering your limitations.”

Thorin raises her hands. “I did not mean to offend.”

Bilbo forgoes the polite reply of “none take” - because, if anything, this journey so far has taught her to be honest. And she’d found that sentiment offensive.

“I understand,” she replies instead. “And I hope you will understand that for me to end this journey here does mean breaking my promise.”

Thorin opens her mouth -

And a rapid knock on the door interrupts her instead. A moment later the door is thrown open and another familiar face - Dwalin, Bilbo thinks - storms in, inclines his head toward Thorin. “Apologies for the interruption. We just had word a group of rebels is headed toward the city.”

Thorin curses under her breath; Bilbo echoes the sentiment.

“When will they be here?” Thorin asks.

“Not certain,” Dwalin replies. “They either have allies in the city or it’s another group that’s taken advantage, but fighting has broken out at the bazaar, and somebody’s set fire to one of the cotton factories.”

“We need to leave,” Thorin concludes. “Tell everyone to prepare. We leave within the hour.”

With a sharp nod Dwalin turns on his heel and stalks out. Thorin climbs to her feet, setting aside her pipe, and casting a frown at Bilbo. “I’m afraid we will have to end our conversation at this point, Miss Baggins,” she announces curtly. “We will have - “

“Let me come with you,” Bilbo demands, without rising from the cushions. “This city is set to blow; I haven’t had a chance to make arrangements to get out.” She shrugs. “What do you think my chances are?”

Thorin’s lips twist downward.

Bilbo’s conscience scolds her lightly - she’s a witch, unless the attack is of a magical nature, escaping the city won’t be difficult for her. On the other hand, should Thorin be willing to abandon her to her fate -

“Very well,” Thorin huffs. “You can come with us. Can you ride?”  
  


**Author's Note:**

> 1\. I hope to have the second and final chapter up by tomorrow. (There is a chance this could be three chapters. Or more.)  
> 2\. If at any point in the next months I'll find myself in Kashar, Osh, or anywhere in between, I'll blame this fic. Also, in that case there will likely be more chapters.


End file.
